Benjamin Rush (1745-1813) became one of the earliest advocates of humane treatment for the mentally ill with the publication of Medical Inquiries and Observations Upon Diseases of the Mind, the first American textbook of psychiatry.

1930’s

Psychiatrists began to inject insulin to induce shock and temporary coma as a treatment for schizophrenia.

Egas Moniz published an account of the first human frontal lobotomy. Between 1936 and the mid-1950s, an estimated twenty thousand of these surgical procedures were performed on American mental patients.

1940’s

Electrotherapy (applying electric current to the brain) was first used in American hospitals to treat mental illnesses.

1960’s

Conventional antipsychotic drugs, were first used to control outward (“positive”) symptoms of psychosis, bringing a significant measure of calm and order to previously noisy and chaotic psychiatric wards.

Lithium revolutionized the treatment of manic depression.

422,000 individuals were hospitalized for psychiatric care in the United States.

1980’s

Rise of managed care–short-stay hospitalization with community treatment became the standard of care for mental illness.

1990’s

Brain imaging is used to learn more about the development of major mental illnesses.

(1994) The 1st first-line of the atypical antipsychotic drugs, is introduced. It is the 1st new first-line antipsychotic drug in almost 20 years.